If you have played Raiders of the Pharaoh's Tomb, then you are aware that the above reaction is not the typical reaction you get when you play this game. In fact, my reaction was quite the opposite. It was kind of more like…er…well, how about I just walk you through my game experience instead of just reenacting my geeky fit?

So, I download this game, this…Raiders of the Pharaoh's Tomb. It’s supposed to be a game about Indiana Jones. The title sounds kind of Indiana Jones-ish, so that’s a good start. And by the looks of the screenshot, it was done Atari style. Atari is cool. That’s another plus. In fact, this game is a made up sequel to Raiders of the Lost Ark for the Atari 2600… Well, now we know what expectations we have for this game. Let’s see if it lives up to them.

But, before I get into the game itself, I’m going to stop here for a minute or two and talk about one of the first things that caught my eye after I extracted the game files. The game creator…included…an instruction manual! And I’m not talking about a bland, one page Word document. I mean a real, seven page with four tip sheets instruction manual! Granted, it’s not made of paper, but you can print it out, staple it together, and it’d be almost as good!

The manual looks nice. Its visual style fits well with the theme of the game, and gives you just enough precise and to-the-point information to help you find your way without majorly spoiling anything. The manual also warns you before you come across any spoilers, which is nice for those gamers that like to figure stuff out for themselves. The only problem I have with the instruction manual is that each page is its own individual JPEG image. It probably would have been better if it was made into a multiple page PDF instead, so you don’t have to keep opening and closing the “pages”, or have them all open at the same time. But, enough about the manual. Let’s get back to the game.

By now, I am hoping that the same effort that was put into the manual was also put into the game. Was it? Well, I have to say…YES! This is one of the very, very few Game Maker games that actually kept me playing all day long. Now, I can’t say too much about the game without spoiling a lot, but I will say that the game stays true to the original Atari game it was patterned after. In fact, I think it’s better because Raiders of the Lost Ark wasn’t exactly my favorite Atari game. Shhhh.

The gameplay was smooth, and the controls very simple. Yeah, I know. It’s an Atari game. How complex did I expect the controls to be? But seriously. How was the game as far as being a challenge? I’d say pretty good, except after you figure out what you’re supposed to do to get everything, the game becomes really easy to play the second time around. I must admit that I did get pretty stumped at parts, but that was probably due to the fact that I didn’t pay attention to what I was reading in the instruction manual. The music? Classic. Sound effects? Classic. Visuals? Every thing is classic. I pretty much felt like I was playing a real Atari.